Just like that, the county seat's full court of dignitaries died silently on this early morning, the solemn and imposing yamen court turned into a purgatory on earth.
Turning into the rear hall led to a long, slender viewing corridor, flanked on both sides by the scenery of an autumnal courtyard filled with fallen leaves.
Here, Xu Yuan once again caught sight of the beautiful young woman he had seen earlier by the artificial lake.
This time, she was actually wearing a bodice, and attended by maidservants, she was enjoying a rather lavish breakfast alongside a young man whose features bore a resemblance to Magistrate Liu.
A handsome man and a pretty lady, chatting and laughing merrily, framed by golden leaves drifting in the autumn wind—it was an idyllic sight.
Behind the main hall was the magistrate's living quarters; it seemed Xu Yuan's earlier guess had been right on the mark—she was indeed either the magistrate's concubine or his daughter.
He wondered what expression she would wear if she saw the scene inside the yamen court.
A single wall was all that separated the bloody hell of the main hall from the idyllic scenery of the rear estate.
"Changtian, should we silence them?"
Lou Ji had also spotted the attractive pair and asked with interest, "Those two seem to be Magistrate Liu's children."
Xu Yuan looked back with a counter-question. "Is there any need?"
Enveloped within Lou Ji's passive Dao domain, others could not perceive them in the slightest.
Lou Ji curved her eyes in a smile. "Who knows? Perhaps they might stumble upon some fortuitous martial legacy in the future and come seeking vengeance against you, Changtian."
"Seeking vengeance against me?"
Xu Yuan gave Lou Ji an odd look, shook his head, and continued inward along the corridor. "Then they'll probably have to wait in line for years."
A glint of amused warmth danced in Lou Ji's alluring eyes as she sighed with some wistfulness.
"Well, letting a couple of twenty-somethings who've barely reached the eighth rank go is fine. Still, their carefree days are likely over; tomorrow they might well end up on the streets.
"Being an official truly is heaven in one step, hell in the next~"
Xu Yuan paused slightly. Catching the teasing undertone in Lou Ji's words, he chuckled softly.
"Elder Sister, do you think I went too far?"
As they walked, Lou Ji smiled with crinkling eyes, stepping up to link her arm through Xu Yuan's.
"Big Sis never said that. Given what those people did, dying a hundred times wouldn't atone for it. But... killing every last one of them in a single sweep was a bit hasty."
Xu Yuan understood her meaning at once.
"You mean Huizhou County will fall into chaos?"
Lou Ji nodded, casting a glance back toward the blood-drenched yamen court.
"The people who died this morning essentially controlled every facet of Huizhou County. With them dead, their subordinates are bound to get restless. Once order collapses and rival interests clash, I'm afraid Huizhou County won't even be able to maintain basic stability."
Killing people was easy; the hard part was the aftermath.
When both the underworld and legitimate authorities of an entire county were wiped out in one fell swoop, chaos was inevitable in the absence of a leader.
Yet Lou Ji did not stay silent for long. She giggled, changing the subject:
"I'll clean up the mess for you this time, but next time, Changtian, remember to consider the consequences—"
"Before coming here, I already had Bai Muxi get to work."
Xu Yuan calmly cut Lou Ji off. "The routine administration of Huizhou County is handled by the yamen's private secretaries anyway. As for the six gentry families of the county... Muxi knows what to do."
Lou Ji raised an eyebrow, mildly intrigued. "Oh? And what will she do?"
Xu Yuan smiled faintly.
"Kill a few, throw a banquet, and take them in as our dogs."
The alluring curves of Lou Ji's rosy lips lifted, but a flicker of disappointment crossed her eyes.
"Subjugating people through absolute violence might indeed work, but the problem is, Changtian, we're only passing through. Can you stay here permanently, or come inspect the place on a regular basis?
"If not, these gentry will likely lie low for a few years before reverting to their old ways—or worse, they might use you as their backing and become even more insatiable."
"I know that, of course."
Xu Yuan chuckled and shook his head. "There's one thing I've kept forgetting to tell you, Sister."
Lou Ji's willow-leaf brows knit slightly, a hint of confusion surfacing in her eyes. "What is it?"
"In the perilous zone where Bai Muxi resides, hundreds of thousands of her people still survive."
"..." The confusion in Lou Ji's eyes deepened.
"I told Bai Muxi that if she handles this matter well, all the estates and businesses in this county will belong to her."
Lou Ji's shapely brows furrowed tightly.
"You staged this whole production just to swallow the properties of these mundane gentry?"
She was thoroughly dissatisfied with Xu Yuan's explanation.
The only commendable feature of Huizhou County was its proximity to the official post road. Beyond that, it possessed neither special mineral deposits nor spirit fields for cultivating medicinal herbs, nor was the county seat particularly prosperous.
As for the businesses inside and outside the walls, they were hardly worth mentioning.
The strongest individual among the six major gentry clans in the city was a mere Soul Condensation cultivator. Cultivation resources under the control of such factions were practically non-existent; almost everything they owned was mundane.
With these thoughts in mind, Lou Ji's gaze drifted toward the blood-soaked yamen hall.
She sensed Bai Muxi's qi dynamic heading in that direction.
Bai Muxi had taken many of the severed heads, as well as the dossier of evidence Xu Yuan had tossed to the ground. Presumably, she intended to use them to break those families and bring them to heel as dogs.
Sighing inwardly again, Lou Ji's mind settled somewhat.
Looking on the bright side, if using this single county could bind a genius Grandmaster to their side, it wouldn't be a losing bargain...
"Hey, hey..."
Xu Yuan waved a hand smilingly in front of Lou Ji's face. "Sister, what are you daydreaming about?"
Coming back to her senses, Lou Ji glared at him, thinking that this brat still had a long way to go, and snapped, "Nothing. I suppose relocating hundreds of thousands of people to Huizhou County won't be any trouble at all, hm?"
"You'll help, won't you?" Xu Yuan blinked at Lou Ji.
Lou Ji raised a slender hand and rubbed her brow in exasperation. "Do you have any concept of what moving hundreds of thousands of people entails?"
"You won't help?"
"Figure it out yourself."
"Why?"
"No reason."
"Didn't you say earlier that you'd listen to whatever I said?"
"Your big sister changed her mind. Got a problem with that?"
Lou Ji gave a soft huff and turned her face away.
The greater the expectation, the greater the disappointment.
She had assumed Changtian acted this way because he had grand designs in mind to resolve this rotten grassroots governance. She never imagined his sights would be set on such petty pickings...
Seeing this, Xu Yuan still chuckled.
"Sister, are you angry?"
"Not angry. Just a bit disappointed."
"Disappointed by what?"
"#!"
Lou Ji's lips pressed together slightly; even with her composure, she felt an urge to give him a beating at this moment.
"..."
Seeing Lou Ji's increasingly dangerous gaze, Xu Yuan's expression immediately turned solemn.
This big sister of his truly would beat him.
"You think I'm being too shallow?"
"What do you think?"
"Then what if I told you that more than half of Bai Muxi's hundreds of thousands of people possess cultivation aptitude, have been religiously indoctrinated, and are unfailingly loyal?"
"..."
The moment those words fell, the corridor fell so silent that a dropped pin would have echoed.
Lou Ji instinctively stopped in her tracks, turning her head to stare blankly at Xu Yuan's grinning expression.
After staring at him for several breaths, Lou Ji's tone took on a note of solemnity:
"Changtian, you speak the truth?"
As an absolute core figure of the Prime Minister's Manor and the commander-in-chief of the Black Scale Guards, Lou Ji knew all too well what lay behind those words.
As the Prime Minister's Manor's "recruitment apparatus," Tian'an Martial Halls were spread across the realm, yet recruiting a single soldier for the Black Scale Army remained exceedingly difficult.
The vast majority of people in this world were incapable of cultivation. Those who survived the layer upon layer of screening at Tian'an Martial Hall were few and far between, and even after graduating from Tian'an Martial Hall, they would not necessarily choose to enlist in the Black Scale Army.
Calling it one in a hundred was being generous.
Decades of accumulated planning had yielded fewer than a million troops.
And now, suddenly, here were hundreds of thousands of loyal subjects with cultivation aptitude...
What was more,
these people were hidden pieces known to no one.
As the autumn wind brushed past her silky black hair, Lou Ji's breathing quickened, the soft swells of her chest rising and falling erratically as her jade-green eyes stared hungrily at the brat before her.
Seeing this big sister of his like this for the first time, Xu Yuan's gaze wavered slightly, and he cleared his throat.
"Before coming to Huizhou County, I studied the map. While Huizhou County isn't a vital strategic stronghold, its transportation is exceptionally convenient. Located at the junction of Guanghuai and Jingbei provinces, a hundred li to the west lies the Jingbei post road. Northward, one can control the transport chokepoint of Qinlong Pass; southward, one can march straight into the capital region.
"More importantly, with the war in the Northern Border, this area sees a massive influx of transient population. Furthermore, it has no cultivation resources and no scarce mineral veins. An influx of large numbers of northern refugees won't draw scrutiny from other factions—making it ideal for concealing troops."
As he spoke, Xu Yuan continued along the corridor toward the secret chamber where the formation hub was located.
"Besides, Bai Muxi follows me because I can save her people. If things dragged on too long, she would inevitably harbor resentment. This serves as an answer to her as well."
Lou Ji followed at an unhurried pace, her dress fluttering and leaving behind a trail of alluring fragrance.
"So your killing of those officials wasn't done on a whim, Changtian?"
"No, it truly was on a whim."
Xu Yuan shook his head, his voice calm. "Looking through that stack of their crimes, I wouldn't have felt comfortable if I hadn't killed them."
Every crime listed on those sheets of paper was brief, but what lay behind those cold numbers?
Countless innocent lives snuffed out by the greed of those dignitaries.
Hearing this, Lou Ji sighed faintly, her gaze turning somewhat complex.
"I understand..."
"Still, Changtian, try to do this sort of thing less often in the future. Though your status allows you to slaughter these lower-tier magnates at will, these very parasites are the foundation of Great Yan's rule today."
Xu Yuan chuckled softly and murmured, "I know. It's far from the time to bring the knife down on them."
"Bring the knife down?" Lou Ji's brows knit slightly.
Hearing the slight surprise in her voice, Xu Yuan turned back, equally surprised.
"Father never thought about taking the knife to these people?"
Lou Ji's seductive eyes held a mixture of amusement and helplessness as she smiled and countered:
"How could he? There will always be nobility and elites in this world. Even if you slaughter one batch, a new one will emerge to take their place.
"In a single county, the imperial court's authority can still suppress the fallout. But if this spread to a commandery, a prefecture, or an entire province, it would mark the start of outright rebellion."
Xu Yuan suddenly realized that even his formidable old man's thinking was constrained by the limitations of their era. After a few breaths of silence, he said:
"At the very least, it should be made so that the powerful cannot treat human life like grass as they do now."
Lou Ji watched the calm-eyed young man with a faint smile, as if catching a glimpse of the peerless youth his father once was:
"Your father said the exact same thing back then. But walking this path over the years, he gave up on it. In a sense, he himself has become one of those powerful elites who treat human life like grass."
An insurmountable chasm always lay between ideals and reality.
Lofty ideals die at the hands of base desires.
Hearing this, Xu Yuan chuckled and shook his head.
"There will always be a way. Even if Father couldn't do it, and I can't do it, future generations will eventually find one."
Lou Ji curled her lips in a teasing smile.
"Trusting in the wisdom of future generations?"
While talking, the two had already passed through the long, slender corridor and arrived at an area enclosed by stone-tiled walls—the location of Huizhou County seat's formation hub.
Under the influence of Lou Ji's passive Dao domain, none of the martial apprentices guarding the area noticed their arrival.
Xu Yuan fell quiet for a moment, stepping into the stone courtyard as he murmured softly:
"Not entirely. At least we can make a start."
Lou Ji's eyes flickered. Linking her arm with his, she asked with a smile:
"How would we start?"
Xu Yuan shook his head and sighed leisurely.
"It's too far off. Thinking about this before the sect problem is even solved feels a bit like celebrating at halftime."
Lou Ji held him a little tighter, her voice soft and coaxing:
"Tell your big sister. It sounds like you have some ideas, Changtian?"
"Too many to explain all at once."
"Then just tell me one of them~"
Xu Yuan glanced at the big sister who was practically hanging off him, sighed, and slowly spoke three words:
"Enlighten the masses."
Hearing this, Lou Ji's expression turned quite strange.
"Enlighten the masses?"
"It's often said that humble households rarely produce noble sons, but even the 'humble households' in that saying are at worst destitute gentry. In the final analysis, it's because the gentry monopolize knowledge. Common folk have no access to books, so imperial examinations naturally have nothing to do with ordinary peasants."
Xu Yuan raised a finger and pointed around the yamen, continuing, "Since the common people cannot afford schooling, why not have the imperial court establish education across the realm, gathering talent from all corners to serve the state? By opening up avenues of upward mobility for commoners, supplemented by institutional oversight, we could dismantle the gentry's privileged status to a certain degree."
Hearing Xu Yuan's broad outline, Lou Ji caught on swiftly, her voice carrying a trace of seriousness.
"The method is indeed promising. Supporting such an undertaking with Great Yan's national strength wouldn't be difficult..."
At that point, Lou Ji's voice trailed off.
She suddenly realized the drawback of this method.
Her alluring eyes narrowed, her tone turning slightly chilly.
"Changtian, while this measure would indeed weaken the gentry, once the minds of the masses are opened, over time, it won't just threaten imperial rule—it will go far beyond that!"
Xu Yuan shrugged and asked with a chuckle:
"If people can fill their bellies and survive, who would rebel for no reason? Besides, how is this any different from Father and the Emperor opening martial academies to teach cultivation techniques to commoners?"
"The difference is immense!"
Lou Ji's voice was deadly serious. "Changtian, you should know the fundamental difference between enlightening the masses and imparting cultivation methods. Furthermore, the scale of what you're proposing is vastly different."
Seeing that he couldn't brush it off, Xu Yuan merely shrugged again.
"Nothing in this world is flawless. Everything has pros and cons. And like I said, we're only making a start. You have to trust in the wisdom of future generations~"
With that,
Xu Yuan dropped the subject entirely, pointing toward the secret chamber inscribed with the formation hub as he smiled cheerfully.
"Sister, let's head in and get down to business."
Seeing his familiar shamelessness, Lou Ji gave a cold snort.
"I'll report everything you said to your father. Once we deal with this assassination attempt and return to the capital, you can wait for him to have a talk with you."
Xu Yuan, completely unbothered like a dead pig unafraid of boiling water, waved his hand and asked with a grin:
"I know, I know. Sister, how long until Maternal Uncle and Xu Changge arrive?"
Chapter 424